Gradual School, Revisited

It's that time of year again...graduation season. Been there, done that.Wrote about it too, here and here.
This is a recap for the GenFab website.

I had raced through my UC Berkeley undergraduate program at lightning speed—taking a mere nine years to earn my bachelor’s degree. By the time I collected that hard-won diploma, I was married, working full-time, and pregnant with my first baby! My father-in-law and my husband came to see me graduate. Not much fanfare after all that time.

After I graduated, I was a stay-at-home mom for five years. But then I got restless.

I’d been doing some peer counseling with parents of babies with heart defects in the NICU at UCSF, but knew I should get some formal training. I figured I could whip through a two-year Master’s program in four years, tops. Two kids by then, a busy life, grad school—how hard could it be? 

It felt good to say I was applying to graduate school when the inevitable question ("what do you do?") came up. I got defensive about being a stay-at-home mom. It was 1982—most of the women I knew had jobs and business cards. But I could wrestle two kids into car seats and get myself dressed every day, and I made a mean grilled cheese. Ask me anything about Sesame Street. Go me!

After I decided to apply to school, the first hurdle was The Test. I sidestepped the GRE and took the Miller Analogies Test. I thought it would be a piece of cake, but those things were hard—and they got harder. Who knew? A is to B as B is to... WTF? But I got a good enough score, and entered the Master’s program in clinical counseling at the local State University.

 I would've graduated in four years too, except for one little thing: my third child, who appeared in June of 1986. What lengths I went through to avoid writing my thesis!

However, I finally finished—and graduated in 1988. The thing I remember most about my graduation day? Stepping out of the procession to race to the bathroom, running back to find my place in line, and ending up being the first person to walk across the stage. Much applause and woo-hoo-ing for me: first in my class!

First in my class...to walk across the stage

Fast forward a few years and a career change. I left hospitals behind for high school.

After 15 years of working with seniors as a college counselor, I’d reached a crossroads: I could keep doing what I was doing and wonder what it would’ve been like to live a writer's life—or I could take the plunge and live that life.

So I took a deep breath and applied to local MFA programs in creative writing. All those years of going over student essays with a sharp eye and a sharpened pencil gave me a perspective I didn't have when I'd applied to grad school the first time, nearly twenty five years before.

The two-year program devoted to writing was a hard-won gift to myself (and from my husband, who thought he was done paying for college), and a chance to put my resolve to the test. Would I be open to criticism of my writing by a group of people I didn't know? Would I have something to offer the other writers? Would I be able to stay awake in class and get the reading done on time? I was way out of practice.

I started the program with excitement and trepidation. I ditched my "going to work" wardrobe and settled into a jeans and t-shirts routine. I let my hair grow to long-ago lengths, and noticed what the other "girls" were wearing. It was challenging and fun to sit around and talk about writing for hours in workshop and craft classes. I took the critiques of my classmates to heart, and enjoyed offering my feedback—both in class and in the margins. 

For the first time in my academic career, I was neither working nor raising kids (or having a baby mid-way through). Maybe it’s no coincidence that I finished on time.

At my graduation in 2011, I had the biggest rooting section ever: family and friends cheered, sat through boring speeches, and toasted me with bubbly at the end. I wore the gown, the hood and the silly hat, crossed my tassel from left to right, and celebrated the beginning of a new chapter.

Off I go...

Uplifting Lessons from Mom

Probably the most important lesson I learned from my mother took place in a fitting room in Macy's lingerie department. She was a firm believer in my having the proper support from the very beginning. Once we started to develop, my sister and I were whisked off downtown to Macy's.  When it was my turn, my mother and I were ushered  into a tiny room with three-way mirrors. The saleslady undraped a tape measure from  her shoulders, deftly wrapped it around my chest, and fitted me for my first bra. Even though I was very young, I got the full attention of the saleslady  and my mother as I turned this way and that to model.

My grandmother hadn't paid any attention to my mother when she reached that stage of development. Growing up, we heard stories about how a friend's mother had been the one to take my mother bra shopping, and also taught her how to take care of herself during her periods. But the bras came too late, according to the stories.  The damage had already been done. At a  young age, my mother resembled the tribal  women you used to see in those old National Geographic magazines--the ones whose breasts lay nearly flat against their bodies.

My mother had to have special bras made for her, since  underwires didn't exist back then.

She kept those handmade bras forever, until my sister and I finally convinced her that she could branch out and go for a leopard print push-up and why the hell not? We convinced her that underwear didn't have to just be utilitarian and boring. So we taught her something too.


Not only did she make sure we got properly  fitted bras, she also made sure we had black ones to wear under dark clothes. This caused quite a stir in my junior high PE locker room, and got a rise out of any nearby boys when an errant strap peeked out of my blouse during class.


We always hear about women not wearing the right size bra. I've seen reports that say around 80% of women fit that profile. Most women hate to go bra shopping, so they keep wearing bras that fall down on the job. It doesn't have to be that way.

The lesson I learned from my mother is that it's  worth every penny to get a bra that fits right and gives you the silhouette you want.

It was just one way she tried to take care of her girls, and ours.

The Call of the Void

 In a recent  article in The Wall Street Journal, Chris Allbritton puts a name to the feeling that I've had more and more frequently when I'm up high and looking down: l'appel du vide, or the call of the void. He describes it this way:

"It's an urge, when you reach the edge of a high drop, to throw yourself into the great beyond. It has called to me at the edge of cliffs, on the observation deck of the Empire State Building and even at the top of stepladders when I've been changing light bulbs. It's a feeling that starts in the pit of my stomach--and has engendered in me a profound terror of heights."

Ditto, except for the stepladder.

But who knew there was a name for this? And a French name, at that.

I had never heard it described this way. I have never mentioned that I experience this feeling to anyone. But it's the reason I stay away from ledges,  edges, and balconies. I won't pause to admire the view if there isn't a wall and a window in front of me. It's the reason I refused to pose for a picture on the edge of a cliff  in Sydney when my husband suggested it, even though plenty of people sat right down on a jutting-over-the abyss rock and smiled for the camera. I practically jumped away from it and wouldn't even let him sit there for a picture.  I found out there was another ledge right below, hidden from view--but I still kept far away.

The first time I really noticed this urge was on a trip to Hawaii several years ago, when I had to back away from the small patio overlooking the hotel grounds, even though I felt almost hypnotically compelled to stand there and look down at the palm trees, the plumeria, and the rushing waterfall far below. I freaked myself out. Mai Tais were in order, and thankfully the bar was at ground level.


In "One Giant Leap," Allbritton describes how he conquered his fear of heights and the call of the void: he strapped on a parachute  and jumped out of an airplane over New Zealand's South Island.

Good for him.

 As for me, I'm not sure it's the way I'd choose to deal with this fear. His dive sounds wonderful in a way. But just reading about it caused me some discomfort. I worried about him all the way through his observations of what he saw as he plummeted for 19,500 feet  near the Franz Josef Glacier.  While it was pleasant to revisit my trip to New Zealand and my own climb on a glacier as I read the travel information in the sidebar, I do not feel tempted to make a 3.7-mile leap from an airplane any time soon.
 

Though the jump left Allbritton's  fear of heights behind him (at least for the moment, after he landed on terra firma), he didn't know if it would be a permanent life-change.

He claims that the jump left him "drunk on thrill." He had me at drunk.

I do admire his chutzpah for facing his fear in such a dramatic fashion, but I'll have to figure out another way for myself.

 I'm working up to it.

Great balls of...?

...no, not fire this time. Yarn. 
(This is an updated version of an earlier post)

Not me, or Marsha

           I've been knitting since my friend Marsha taught me how back in high school. Which means a lot of knits and purls and dropped stitches over the years.

          All the sweaters I’d ever made over  nearly twenty-five years—several for my husband and for each of the kids, including the  baby sweaters and blankets I’d tucked away, just in case we might have grandchildren eventually—went up in flames in 1991 when my neighborhood burned to the ground. 
              I replaced my needles, bought some yarn, and started knitting again. Knitting was such a huge part of my life and still is: I love the feel of the wool and the sound of the needles sliding together. And in the end, someone has something to wear or cuddle up with.

 A brief history of knitting: 

•  Eons ago, Egyptian women figured out how to spin cotton and silk into thread and create a series of knots that became articles of clothing. 

Seriously? A Coptic sock

• Once the art of knitting reached Europe along the trade routes from Egypt, knitters began using wool. The earliest references to knitting as we know it today date back to the early 14^th century. 
•  What we refer to as fisherman sweaters were worn by actual fishermen; the lanolin in the untreated wool protected the men from the elements when they went to sea. The traditional patterns on these sweaters had significance to the wives who made them, and for the husbands who wore them: the honeycomb represented the hard-working bee; the rope-like cable pattern signified good luck; the diamond was a wish for success and wealth; and the basket stitch represented the hope for a good haul.

Here's the one I made:

I am not fishing here. I'm bottling merlot. But the same principles apply. Hard work, good luck, and a lot of bottles...

              The sweaters I've made are marks on the  timeline of my life so far: this one for the boyfriend; then that one for the husband, for the baby, for the next baby and the next. For a grandchild. Needles clicking, time passing, life unspooling, things unraveling or taking shape. Each new project represented a new challenge: some were eventually tossed aside with anger or sorrow and frustration, while others were met head on and overcome with triumph.

And in 1992,  I created the world. 

It took me longer than seven days— longer than six days, I should say. More like a couple of months--three, tops. And I did it with yarn and knitting needles. I created the world with yarn and knitting needles, and then I gave it to a child who never really liked it because it was a “little itchy.”

Making this sweater was like knitting a picture, kind of the yarn equivalent of “paint by numbers.”   When creating Earth, I started in the Southern Hemisphere and worked my way northward. Beginning with Tierra del Fuego, and proceeding up the continent of South America, I traveled  from one pole to the other, channeling my inner Rand/McNally. 

There is no accuracy in the scale of my universe, of course. The moon, a smiling crescent, is about the same size as Earth. Call it creative/poetic license. And the planets are not in the right order either. The stars are as large as the planets and it’s all kind of higgledy- piggledy when you think about it.

What a wonderful World...

I still have the sweater. You don’t just toss out the universe when someone “outgrows” it, or because it’s “too itchy” to wear more than once. The boy I made it for is a grown man now. He vaguely remembers the sweater, but I see it every day, captured in a photograph. A tolerant young boy, hands at his sides, well-aware of the gross injustice imposed on him by having to wear this sweater.

  

The End

Memories of Dad

A tribute to my father

Sharing a laugh on Father's Day

My dad always told me  I was a writer. He said this with admiration, I think. He encouraged me to write and would often help me when I got stuck.  When I was taking an upper division English class as a freshman at Cal, he introduced me to the concept of an oxymoron—way before the meaning got attached to phrases like "military intelligence." It was a tough class, but I knocked myself out to do well in it, and I still think fondly of "Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird."

It broke my dad's heart when I declared a major in criminology.  He asked, “What will you do? Wear a lab coat? You're a writer. You should write!" Naturally, I resisted his interference.  "I'm writing!" I protested, but I knew what he meant. 

He would be happy, but not surprised, to know that  I  now call myself a writer.

  For my 49th birthday, my dad  gave me a copy of Adam Gopnik's Paris to the Moon. I confess that I flipped through the pages, thinking there might be a check tucked inside. But no, it was just the book: a book about Paris, since my dad knew I was traveling with a group to France the following summer. It would be my first trip to Europe and he was excited for me.  So he gave me that book, which I tried to read. I didn't have any context for it, and got lost trying to figure out which arrondissement was which.

   My father passed away in April 2001; my trip was scheduled for that July. He didn't have the chance to wish me bon voyage. On our last evening in Paris, our group leaders arranged for us to have dinner aboard one of the boats that sail slowly up and down the Seine. And under the full moon that night, I thanked him for giving me Paris.

Glasses raised on the bateau mouche

This is something I wrote several years ago, but it feels right to post it today—in his memory.

Checking my rear view mirror at a red light on my way to work one morning, I noticed that the guy in the car behind me was shaving. Glancing in his rear view mirror, he buzzed the electric razor around his chin and neck, feeling for missed whiskers with his other hand. 

 When I was a little girl, my dad used to shave with a mug full of soap, a short stubby brush, and a safety razor. I positioned myself next to him beside the bathroom sink, looking up and watching, mesmerized, as he brushed on a soapy beard and moustache, then methodically scraped it all off until he was Dad again. My close inspection would occasionally earn me a little foam goatee or sideburns. When he finished shaving, pink-cheeked and smooth, he sometimes splashed on a bit of the Old Spice aftershave my sister and I had given him for Father’s Day. 

I remember standing by myself on a step stool in front of the mirror, soaping up my own little girl face and using a corner of a washcloth to scrape it off the way I’d seen him do it: downward stokes, left to right. 

My dad was always particular about the way he looked; it was a rare day when he chose not to shave. He liked to dress sharp and always kept his shoes shined. He did not learn these things from his father, my Grampa Mike , a Russian immigrant who once absentmindedly stuck a sock, instead of a handkerchief, into his breast pocket.

 

Grampa Mike stories never failed to crack us up

Even when my dad’s body started falling apart at age 81, grooming was important to him. With a close shave and combed hair, he felt a little like his old self, even though he knew the old self was never coming back.

From winter to spring during the last year of his life, Dad was in and out of hospitals. He suffered many indignities, experienced a lot of pain, and wept easily. One sunny day, sitting outside for the first time in weeks, he folded over, sobbing and keening, with the intense anguish of a man aware of his loosening grasp on a life he loved. During those months, he often spoke wistfully about his days as a young father with two little girls who called him Daddy, back when he shaved in front of an adoring and mystified audience.

At the end, my dad was cared for at home by a thoughtful attendant who kept him bathed, combed, and shaved. There was a great deal of love and care in these simple, touching acts—the only things that allowed him to keep his dignity. I have one final memory: the feel of my dad’s smooth cheek as I gave him a last goodbye kiss.

I keep a small picture of my father on my desk. Every time I get inspired and click the keys for hours, I look over at him and think: “Hey Dad—Look, I’m a writer!”

He's still bugging me to do more. Thanks, Dad...

M-i-c...k...e...y... M-o-u-s-e: a Mouseketeer Memory

I was sad to read that Annette Funicello passed away. She was one of my favorites on the Mickey Mouse Club.

This was an early post in Zero to Sixty in One Year, but I'm dusting it off for any old-timers out there who loved the show and the Mouseketeers the way I did.



He was my first crush.

Cubby O'Brian played the drums on The Mickey Mouse Club. Much to my dismay, he was always paired up with Karen, who had pretty blonde curls. I didn't look anything like this:

Not me. No way.

When I saw an  article in the SF Chronicle about the Disney Family Museum, it jogged a pleasant memory of those early days of  TV, and the way kids used to pretend we were part of the club too.

Me, with a crush on him-->

Isn't he adorable?

The article mentions Karen and Cubby cut-out dolls...and I am pretty sure I had some! Why else would I have her pretty little face (and his adorable one) seared into my memory? 

I used to play "Karen and Cubby" with my across-the-street-neighbor John when we watched "The Mickey Mouse Club" together. He had a big rumpus room and that's where the TV was. Plenty of room to play and act out what the Mouseketeers were doing.

  The picture of Cubby  (his real name is Carl, but his mom thought he looked like a bear cub -- how cute is that?) today, even with glasses and without the ears, reveals a nice man who looks like he has lived a good life. And he's still playing the drums.

I loved reading about the Mouseketeers in this article. It brought back some of the excitement of watching the show, sprawled on my tummy in front of the TV...  dreaming about the first pint-sized power couple.

Patriotism, Politics, and Playing Ball Revisited

This is something I wrote in 2005. During the opening ceremonies at last  year's World Series Game 2 in San Francisco, a giant American flag filled the field, held high by representatives of our armed services. A Marine who had lost both legs and an arm tossed out the first pitch. The looks on the faces of the athletes was hard to misinterpret. They may have spent time on the DL, but looking at this young man standing tall in his uniform put everything in a very different light. So, here are  my reflections on patriotism, politics, and playing baseball from several years ago. Beer costs way more today, by the way.

For the last two years, I have donned orange and black and headed to the ballpark to see the San Francisco Giants on Opening Day. Thousands of others skipped work and school to sit in the sunshine and root for the home team. Before the mayor tossed out the first pitch, all eyes were on the field as the Coast Guard unfurled an enormous representation of the stars and stripes in straightaway center. Men  and women in uniform lined up along the fences. Four Navy jets buzzed low over the stadium.

With the nation still at war, the pre-game fireworks display and the jets screaming overhead reminded me of what I came to the ballpark to forget for a little while. We have all seen the rockets' red glare, along with bombs bursting in air, for much too long. But how could I allow myself to forget , even for a few hours, that soldiers were fighting and dying far away--young men also wearing uniforms that look nothing like the ones on the players I came to watch on a sunny April afternoon.

                                                                                                          

Ask anyone: baseball is still the national pastime. So going to the ballgame is a patriotic thing to do. After 9/11, "God Bless America" nudged "Take Me Out to the Ballgame" from its traditional spot during the 7th  inning stretch.  Even though many fans are disgusted with the drug use, the trash talk and the $7.75 beers, baseball and its patriotic pull lures us back. No matter where you stand politically, it's hard to avoid the place where baseball and being an American come together. 

It seems that real life no longer stops at the turnstile. We use the occasion of a public gathering to pay tribute to those who have lost or given their lives.  We cannot escape the symbolism of the color guard, standing at attention in center field, as we rise for our national anthem.  Perhaps baseball is giving us an opportunity we might not otherwise take: the chance to stand up, with hats off and hands on our hearts, to proclaim a deep, but troubled love for our country. In luxury boxes and bleachers alike, with tears in our eyes and a catch in our throats, regardless of how we feel about the war and all the rest, we take a moment out of our lives and reflect on what it means today to live in "the land of the free and the home of the brave."

Play ball.

April 5, 2013  (Bruce's photo)

The Challenge: Aging Gracefully, with Leather

I'm participating in a Bloghop, which means that a lot of writers are weighing in on the same topic. This time the topic is "What Does Aging Gracefully Mean to You?"

 When I first considered this question, I immediately had several thoughts: One cannot age gracefully if one has not lived gracefully all along. Nothing magic happens when the odometer rolls past those round numbers: 60, 70, 80…100. If you haven’t learned certain lessons along the way, won’t your golden years lack a certain luster? So, then, what does living gracefully mean?

 I raised the question with a dear friend recently. Phyllis and I have known each other since we were young teenagers, and she has been an inspiration to me for many years. Not only that, but she cracks me up like no one else can. So when we had covered the usual 500 topics we talk about when we get together for our long walks, I asked her: what does aging gracefully mean to you? 

We can’t help thinking ahead now that we’ve passed 60. What will the next act look like—and what would we like it to look like? I loved what she came up with, and it gave us even more to talk about as we hiked along the hilly trail at Inspiration Point. 

It’s easy to focus on the superficial—like makeup, hair and clothing styles—when we look at aging gracefully, but the real key has to do with these four things:

1)      Keeping an open heart
2)     Setting and maintaining healthy boundaries
3)     Learning to embrace transition
4)     Being grateful for what you have and what still works

We asked ourselves: Are we living this way now? After all, we observed, we’ll never be this young again! Time to start thinking about how we’ll make the many transitions yet to come. 

  I can cite a real-life example of someone who managed to pull off this aging gracefully thing with panache: my husband’s Aunt Bette. For Bette’s 80^th birthday, my husband and I flew to San Diego to take her to lunch. Bette loved going out to lunch. When we arrived at her home at the appointed hour, she greeted us with big hugs. Her going-to-lunch-at-80 outfit? A black turtleneck sweater, chunky but tasteful gold jewelry, heels, and…black leather pants.  She looked fantastic. 

Bette turned 89 last November, and she threw herself a huge birthday party. I wasn’t able to attend, but I saw the pictures. Her hair was a soft shade of silver, chin length and with a slight wave in front. Her nails were a deep red, as was her lipstick. Her skin glowed. She wore a killer black off-the-shoulder dress and danced the night away. 

At age 86, Bette moved to a new town to be closer to her niece, and in the last three years of her life, she made hundreds of new friends and became active in local organizations. She loved it when everybody in town called her "Aunt Bette." When Bette felt that her driving days were over (on her own), she arranged for transportation when she needed it. On those occasions when she didn’t feel well, she scaled back on her activities and took a break. She entertained at every opportunity, never showed up at a meeting without bringing homemade brownies, went out dancing, and had a regular dinner companion who kept her company. I understand they had plans to go on a cruise together. 

I guess where I’m going with this is that Bette took good care of herself and made sure to stay involved and engaged until the very end. In fact, she was getting dressed up to go out on New Year’s Eve when she suffered a severe stroke.

She did it all: kept an open heart, set healthy boundaries, embraced transitions, and expressed gratitude for the people around her and her ability to do all the things she did—a graceful way to live, and a reminder that there need not be an age limit regarding black leather pants.